Re: [CH] Half -Shell Recipe

The Old Bear (oldbear@arctos.com)
Sun, 10 May 1998 12:29:00 -0400 

In Chile-Heads Digest, v.4 #407, Randy <rock4u@rocketmail.com>wrote:
| 
| Date: Tue, 5 May 1998 05:28:59 -0700 (PDT)
| From: Randy <rock4u@rocketmail.com>
| Subject: [CH] Half -Shell  Recipe
| 
| Hi Jim,
| 
| You're right about the close tie on the official Georgia State
| Roadkill.  However, Armadillos tend to come out on top towards 
| Florida.  I've never seen them out of the South Georgia region.
| 
| Well, I know folks are getting tired of possum so, since you 
| mentioned "possum on the half-shell" here's a recipe I pulled off 
| of the SOAR site:
| 
| Title: Mu Shu Armadillo
|  Categories: Meats
|       Yield: 4 servings
|  
|       3/4 lb boneless armadillo 
|            tenderloin, trimmed     . . . .


Those armadillos are cute little creatures with some very interesting 
traits, including always goving birth to identical quadruplets -- 
some kind of evolutionary cloning adaptation, I guess.

But before you organize a safari out into the countryside to hunt the 
wild armadillo, be sure to read medical journal article:

          URL: < http://www.sma.org/smj/96jul1.htm >

   "There have been several case reports of indigenously acquired 
   leprosy in patients who reported extensive contact with armadillos, 
   including trapping, curing, eating, and wrestling armadillos.  The 
   patient in Case 2 had a history of eating armadillo meat.  A study 
   of 89 Mexican-born patients treated at a Los Angeles County Clinic 
   showed that a significantly higher number of patients with Hansen's 
   disease reported contact with armadillos, compared with controls.  
   Several reported hunting and eating armadillos.  However, a case 
   control study of Hansen's disease patients in Louisiana in 1977 
   failed to show a significant difference in the rates of armadillo 
   exposure between patients with indigenously acquired disease and 
   control subjects."

While it is well known that armadillos can be infected with leprosy in 
the laboratory and, as such, are being used for research into the 
disease and its prevention, there remains some controversy about whether 
the critters carry the disease in the wild.

Here is a facetious little Haiku: 

          Full of leprosy 
          Is armadillo's sharp bite.
          Good thing they're toothless.

To which I may add that there appear to be no documented cases of 
leprosy having been contracted as a result of eating "Mu Shu Armadillo" 
made with chiles.  Seems like there is a grant application here just 
waiting to be completed by someone.

Cheers,
The Old Bear